China News Service, Quanzhou, April 24 (Reporter Zeng Fuzhi and Sun Hong) When the weather is good, the exhibition hall of the Caopu Iron Smelting Site in Qingyang, Anxi, surrounded by green mountains and green water, has white walls and black tiles, and a simple atmosphere. It looks like a painting from a distance. painting.
The exhibition hall is integrated with the nearby ruins, surrounding mountains and rivers, and residential houses, telling visitors the moving stories behind the world heritage sites.
"How to express the professional and profound archaeological results in a language or way that the public can accept and understand is a question we have repeatedly thought about." said Yi Shufeng, director of Fujian Anxi County Museum.
The exhibition hall reproduces the scene of the ancients smelting iron.
Photo by Sun Hong
Looking back at the sound of the hammer in the past for a thousand years
In July 2021, the project "Quanzhou: The World Marine Commerce and Trade Center of Song and Yuan China" was successfully included in the World Heritage List.
For many people, the Qingyangxia Caopu Iron Smelting Site among the 22 heritage sites is somewhat unfamiliar.
It is both "old" and "new". Its "old" is not old, but a precious testimony of the millennium of Quanzhou's iron smelting and handicraft industry; its "new" is a new start based on cultural accumulation.
At the foot of the southwest of Wulang Mountain, the people of the Yu surname in Qingyang Village, Shangqing Township, Anxi County have lived here for generations.
Most of the villagers have heard that there was an iron smelting yard in the village in ancient times, but the age is so long that no one can tell where and how the ancestors smelted.
Until October 2019, the arrival of the archaeological team from the School of Archaeology and Museology of Peking University made the small village lively, and the villagers' curious history of iron smelting by the ancestors was revealed little by little.
"In the beginning, I searched for the furnace and dug for more than a month, and it was all slag." Yi Shufeng told the Chinanews.com reporter that the archaeological team got up at 6:00 every morning, and went to the site after breakfast to start work, and returned to the station in the evening to concentrate. In meetings, to exchange and analyze the archaeological findings of the day, I often stay up until one or two in the morning the next day, with only four or five hours of sleep.
With the deepening of excavation work, a site with an area of tens of thousands of square meters, including smelting sites, ancient mines, ancestral houses, ancient roads and mountains that provide fuel materials for smelting, has gradually been seen by the world.
At present, the archaeological team has completed the first four excavations. Among the 6 smelting furnaces that have been excavated, 5 are judged to be block iron smelting furnaces, and 1 is a forging furnace.
In addition, coins minted in the early 11th century, iron products such as iron nails, iron pieces, and iron blocks, smelting relics such as slag, ores, burning soil, furnace linings, and more than 80,000 pieces of ceramic ware were also found at the archaeological site.
After archaeological excavation, this iron smelting yard "lays" in the canyon, the terrain is high in the north and low in the south, surrounded by mountains on three sides, and the gap in the south is the breeze, forming a natural tuyere. The climate is relatively dry, which is convenient for smelting activities. development.
Iron ore caves, forest vegetation, ancient roads, water systems and other resources are also distributed near the site. An industrial chain from raw materials to processing to transportation is about to emerge.
"It's a good place to make iron by nature." Yi Shufeng introduced that the iron smelting site in Xiacaopu, Qingyang was selected into the preliminary evaluation list of China's top ten new archaeological discoveries in 2020.
This year, the archaeological team of the School of Archaeology, Culture and Museology, Peking University will continue to carry out the fifth phase of archaeological excavation work.
At the excavation site of the Caopu iron smelting site in Qingyang, a protection shed of more than 600 square meters was built according to the mountain.
Photo by Sun Hong
Inadvertently inserting willow willow Quanzhou to add "iron" certificate
It took 20 years for Quanzhou to apply for the World Heritage List to its success. During this period, there have been twists and turns, and the theme has been adjusted many times.
The discovery of the iron smelting site in Anxi, although "inadvertently inserting willows and willows to form a shade", has enriched Quanzhou's side as a manufacturing center outside the trading port, and also reflected the world maritime trade context of Song and Yuan China from another aspect. The clearer the description, the more exciting the story is told.
In the 1970s, the "Nanhai No. 1" shipwreck was unearthed. The ironware found on the ship was the largest cargo after porcelain.
The mainstream view in the archaeological community is that the "Nanhai No. 1" shipwreck should go out to sea in Quanzhou Port, and the porcelain from the sunken ship is mainly from the Dehua kiln, Cizao kiln, and Minqing Yi kiln in Quanzhou. It may be the same as Quanzhou area, most likely from Qingyangxiacaopu.
In "The Excavation and Preliminary Study of the Qingyang Iron Smelting Site in Anxi from 2019 to 2020", Shen Ruiwen, Dean of the School of Archaeology and Museology, Peking University, said that the Qingyang Xiacaopu Iron Smelting Site in Anxi is China's first scientific archaeological excavation of block iron smelting. Sites, carbon-14 dating and ceramic typology studies suggest that its production was concentrated in the Song and Yuan dynasties.
The iron products produced here at that time became an important commodity in the "Maritime Silk Road" trade.
According to archaeological findings, Anxi iron smelting has a complete production chain.
Anxi iron smelting products can be divided into wrought iron (block iron smelting), pig iron, and natural steel. Most of them are sold overseas through Quanzhou Port.
As Shen Ruiwen said, the iron smelting site in Xiacaopu of Qingyang is a representative heritage element in the Quanzhou world cultural heritage that reflects the production of export commodities in the world marine trade center. Its discovery occupies an important position in the history of iron smelting and trade in China and the world.
After the successful application to the World Heritage List, the Caopu Iron Smelting Site in Qingyang County has received more attention.
At the excavation site, a protection shed of more than 600 square meters was built along the mountain to protect the furnaces, strata and important architectural remains discovered by archaeology.
Yi Shufeng introduced, "In order to match the architectural style of local traditional dwellings, the protection shed adopts an antique 'herringbone' sloping eaves, and water troughs and drainage pipes are installed on each eaves to prevent rainwater from damaging the ruins."
In addition, Anxi has also deployed a management team to improve safety protection facilities, strengthen daily management and maintenance, and implement 24-hour monitoring and supervision of the exhibition hall and cultural relics warehouse through the purchase of services.
Anxi rattan iron home modern handicrafts are exported to overseas.
Photo by Sun Hong
Passing down the fire to pass on rattan and iron craftsmanship to the world
After the Song and Yuan Dynasties, with the reduction of maritime trade activities, the iron smelting handicraft industry in Quanzhou gradually declined.
But the skills related to iron have not been interrupted, but have been passed down from generation to generation.
In Qingyang Village, there are still many famous blacksmiths from Shili Baxiang, who have become living witnesses of this traditional industry.
In Anxi County, where Qingyang Village is located, craftsmen have inherited innovative bamboo and rattan weaving skills, making them continue their frontiers with iron on this hot land where the fire is prosperous and the molten iron is flowing, turning ordinary materials into exquisite pieces of rattan and iron. Home crafts are sold to more than 60 countries and regions in the world.
In August 2019, Anxi was awarded the title of "World Capital of Rattan and Iron Crafts" by the World Crafts Council.
With the rise of the Internet, with the unique industrial advantage of rattan and iron craftsmanship, young people who originally went out to work have returned to their hometowns to start businesses and help the development of the industry.
In Fulin Village, Shangqing Township, almost every household has a Taobao store.
On one side is the rattan and iron craft workshop for orderly processing, and on the other side is the online sales in full swing, which has almost become the daily life of the villagers.
"At the end of 2021, the design and construction of the road around the village will begin, and it is expected to be completed and put into use in two years." Wu Jiangnan, chairman of Anxi Hexing Arts and Crafts Co., Ltd. and secretary of the party branch of Fulin Village, told reporters that at present, the annual output value of rattan iron craft in Fulin Village is about 2 100 million yuan (RMB, the same below), after the Ring Village Road is put into use, it will promote the second take-off of the e-commerce industry in Fulin Village.
Up to now, Anxi has more than 2,200 household craft enterprises and 150,000 employees.
In 2021, Anxi rattan and iron home handicrafts will achieve an output value of 23 billion yuan.
Now, walking into the Caopu iron smelting site in Qingyang, although the fire of iron smelting has been extinguished, people can still explore the iron smelting wisdom of ancient ancestors.
More importantly, the millennium iron smelting technology has been continuously inherited, and the legacy of the "Iron Bone" in the Song Dynasty has continued to this day.
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